Public Key Photography

Peer inside my world at the 20mission co-living community, live & 24/7...

Stamp your own portrait to the photostream! 📸

The Exhibit

Public Key Photography is an interactive photobooth that allows hallway passers-by to preview the always-on webcam in my room, and take their own snapshot that is instantly posted to the StephTheGeek Discord chat community.

I have been broadcasting my life online through various webcam installations since 2001. In today's world where we pose, curate, and filter selfies for semi-anonymous public consumption on sites such as Instagram, PKP delivers unaltered immediacy.

20mission is an eclectic community of 40+ individuals in a shared co-living space in San Francisco, California. As a technology artist, I am grateful for this opportunity to connect experimentations in online radical transparency with my social circle in meatspace, where housemates & their guests can participate in this public story!

Installation Gallery

Example Photos

Tech Specs

Nexus 5X Android phone

PopSocket mount

Software:

Fully Kiosk

One S10 Camera

Discord

Dolphin Browser

About the artist

As 'StephTheGeek' since 2000, I have witnessed the art & play of the webcam evolve from intermittent 320x240px images to a diverse empire of HD streaming video. It was perhaps difficult to predict at the time that "selfies" would become such a defining aspect of internet culture.

My graduate studies at UC Berkeley were an attempt to comprehend the state of coveillance I had thrown myself into. During the mid-2000s, I published a live stream of my web browsing activity, created the first cell phone-based webcam, and dabbled in pre-Foursquare era location sharing.